


We who are even now so young

by fictionalaspect



Category: Bandom, Panic At The Disco
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-25
Updated: 2010-11-25
Packaged: 2017-10-13 10:51:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/136516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fictionalaspect/pseuds/fictionalaspect
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"If I was a school guidance counselor," Spencer says. "I'd be sitting you down and asking if you wanted to talk about your feelings."</p><p>"What the fuck?" Ryan says.</p><p>"Obviously, I'm not," Spencer says. His hair's too long, blowing in the wind. It's brushing up against the collar of his T-shirt. Ryan wonders if he's planning on ever cutting it again. "So let's drive out in the desert and blow something up."</p>
            </blockquote>





	We who are even now so young

I remember I left for awhile.  
We all left for awhile;  
even the music was frightening. How  
to strip ourselves like that, point  
at the places that were wanted, plucked  
and peeled; speaking the words, hearing them form us,  
the nature of what we were  
and could do to each other?  
-Paisley Rekdal, _A Pornography_

  


The fact that Ryan Ross has no fucking clue what he wants is made very clear to him one afternoon in March.

There's the weird jingle of the cash register in the old record shop, the one with the cracking plaster on the walls and the pretty girls with dark eyes behind the counter. The cash register opens with a _ching-thunk!_ , and the girl behind it takes Ryan's twenty dollar bill and smiles at him. She's tall and curvy, short black hair and blue eyes, and Ryan stares at her for a minute and forgets to be mysterious.

Forgets to be anything except Ryan Ross, barely seventeen, too skinny and currently drinking his second Red Bull of the day. Currently purchasing the latest album by Rise Against, and that's enough to earn a smile from the girl behind the counter. She's really pretty. She hands him his change, and their hands brush.

Ryan realizes, in that moment, that precise second, that he doesn't want to have sex with her.

And it's not just her, it's every pretty girl, every single smile and wide-eyed glance, and Ryan _likes_ them and he wants to spend time with them and talk to them and be around them, but he just doesn't—

Shit.

-

"What is your deal lately?" Spencer asks him. He's in the passenger seat, feet kicked up on the open window. His shoelaces are slightly untied, and the plastic tips on the ends make a tittering noise as they smack against his violet suede sneakers.

"What do you mean?" Ryan says. He grips his fingers on the wheel. He turns the radio up louder, thumping drums and a quick, rough guitar on the fifth track, and he almost doesn't hear it when Spencer says, "I don't know, you tell me."

"Huh?" Ryan says, and turns the music down, against his better judgment.

"If I was a school guidance counselor," Spencer says. "I'd be sitting you down and asking if you wanted to talk about your feelings."

"What the fuck?" Ryan says.

"Obviously, I'm not," Spencer says. His hair's too long, blowing in the wind. It's brushing up against the collar of his T-shirt. Ryan wonders if he's planning on ever cutting it again. "So let's drive out in the desert and blow something up."

"Don't you have homework?" Ryan says.

"Don't _you_ have homework?" Spencer says. "I'm only a sophomore. No one cares if I do my homework. You're the smart one."

"You know no one cares," Ryan says. He thinks about how many assignments he's tossed off, how many times he's been able to sit down a period before class and write the worst shit that comes to mind and have his Advanced Creative Writing teacher tell him there's really something special about his work. Ryan's pretty sure she's just never come across anyone who actually expresses emotions like negativity and hopelessness in their poems. "It doesn't matter if I do it now or later."

"Good," Spencer says. Then, "How much do you think Crystal would miss her old Barbie house?"

-

The answer to Spencer's question is—quite a lot, apparently.

Ginger glares at them and banishes Ryan from the house for a sum total of five hours. Ryan doesn't tell her how awesome it looked, the flaming, melting plastic rising towards the sky. He doesn't say _thank you_ when she calls back that night and tells him to come over for dinner, they're having tacos, she's made extra. Ginger always makes "extra," exactly enough to feed one Ryan Ross, drifter, _artiste_ , skinny teenager who needs to eat more.

Ryan does stay and clean up the table. Spencer disappears somewhere, but Ryan stays and soaks the silverware and wipes down the wooden dining room table and rinses off the plates. He loads them into the dishwasher and Ginger brushes a hand over his cheek and Ryan knows he's forgiven.

-

The problem with being in a band, even in a terrible band, is that somehow it always slips out in conversation. It's like Ryan's voice has a direct pathway to his mouth, no brain needed to interfere, and so he ends up saying casually _yeah, we're in a band, you should come see us, good stuff_ to every scene kid he meets.

"Stop trying to get laid," Spencer mutters, flicking Ryan in the back of the neck. "That shit only works in movies."

"It kind of works," Ryan says, but it's an empty protest. He doesn't know why he's telling pretty girls that he's in a band. One, they're more interested in the _actual_ band, the one on stage, the one that exists outside of Ryan's head. And two—-yeah.

Girls.

Yeah.

"You want a drink?" Spencer says, nudging Ryan's arm. "I'm going to—" He bobs his head towards the bar, pressed two deep with kids buying water and soda and beer.

"You going to try to get laid?" Ryan says. He's seen Spencer work his magic before. He's got that smile—it disarms people. He's funny and sarcastic and more than once he's sent Spencer to get them drinks only to find him holed up in the corner with someone, laughing about nothing.

"Depends," Spencer says easily. "Are you going to pay me back for the drink? Because otherwise I might try and find a sugar momma."

"Shut up," Ryan says. A smile bleeds from the edges of his mouth. "You wouldn't."

"Sugar daddy?" Spencer says, grinning, and Ryan laughs and then abruptly snaps his mouth shut. He shoves his hand into his pocket, fingers fumbling in the tiny space, and then presses two dollars into Spencer's hand.

"Pepsi," Ryan says, and then he stares out at the crowd until Spencer shrugs and turns away.

-

Trevor's a wash. Trevor's a fucking lameass and even though, _even though_ Ryan knows his band isn't going anywhere it still makes him angry when he's left staring it in the face.

"I know a guy," Brent says, and something about the way he says it makes Ryan even angrier. It's dumb, because that's not what Brent means. He means a guy for the band, not for Ryan, but somewhere in his messed-up head he hears _here is a new and interesting person that you are going to meet. here is someone new._

"If you want," Ryan says, shrugging carelessly. "That's cool. Bring him by. Maybe he won't cut and run on us like that asshole did."

-

Brendon is loud. Brendon is awkward.

Brendon's also kind of cute, but in a weird way. It's nothing that Ryan feels any need to act on, more of a detached observation. Ryan's been attempting to notice stuff like that lately, to put it all in a framework. _here are the people i like. here are the ones I don't._

 _jesus christ what do i even want to do with my dick._

It's all academic, Ryan tells himself. It's not about sex. It's about hands and arms and eyes, and the people they belong to, and at this point Ryan doesn't even care. It's that he can't figure this shit out, and he needs to, because he hasn't been laid in six months and the more time goes by the more he knows people are starting to get suspicious. _Spencer_ is starting to get suspicious. Ryan knows that Spencer suspects he's hiding someone behind his back, sneaking out to maintain another relationship that's going to blow up in his face. Spencer thinks he's being self-destructive again.

Ryan wonders what Spencer would do if he told him that he's taking a vow of celibacy.

Laugh at him, probably.

-

"Alien versus Predator," Spencer says solemnly, into the phone. "Matinee. Twelve-thirty."

"Where," Ryan says, grinning into the phone. He's barely awake, hair mussed and greasy, face still pressed into the pillow. He can smell himself, and that's not promising.

"Downtown," Spencer says. "Mom said I could take the car. I'll be there in twenty."

"Done," Ryan says, and hangs up. He stumbles into the shower. His cock hangs heavy between his legs, untouched and flushed from sleeping. Ryan ignores it. He'd tried jerking off a few days ago, and it had been more terrifying than anything else. It was like once his brain had been wiped clean of the images he'd thought he was supposed to see—pale, smooth legs, panties and pointed toes, the rounded curve of hip and ass—there had been nothing there at all. They were strange blurry figures, ephemeral, unnerving. They would slide into sharp relief—long fingers, a stark collarbone, hair against skin—and then fade out again. It was like his brain couldn't fix them into being. Like he knew who was supposed to be there, except they weren't.

It was fucking creepy.

Spencer rings his doorbell while Ryan's still getting dressed, pressing long and loud on the button. Ryan snorts to himself, and goes to let Spencer in. His dad's at work. The house is silent around him.

"Hey," Spencer says. He's wearing a heather-grey hoodie and black jeans and red Adidas sneakers. Sometime in the past week, he's gotten a haircut. It's short in the back and long in the front. It swings forward, into his eyes, when he follows Ryan into the house.

"Hurry up," Spencer says. "Carnage awaits."

"Your mom awaits," Ryan says, but he's toeing on his shoes and grabbing his keys. Spencer likes to get to the movie theater early, when they go. He likes to walk around the theatre when the lights are still on and pick the best two seats for maximum movie-viewing pleasure. He likes to get his money's worth.

Spencer hits the brake too hard in the parking lot, and they screech into the spot. Ryan laughs at him, shaking his head. Spencer punches him. He's blushing, a thin band of red highlighting his freckles. "Shut up," Spencer says, slamming the door and stuffing his hands into his back pockets. "It's a delicate process."

"Your mom is a delicate process," Ryan says. He follows Spencer into the theatre. Now that Spencer's cut his hair off, Ryan can see the back of his neck, pale and curving. It makes something foreign rise up in his chest. It's like a secret, this little patch of skin that Spencer's been hiding from everyone. Ryan wants to smooth his thumbs over the bump in Spencer's spine, and he busies himself with digging in his pockets for change. He doesn't know what to make of his sudden impulse. This isn't just some guy, some person on the street. This is Spencer.

Spencer insists on buying them popcorn, coated with butter and shining sickly in the low light. Ryan shrugs, and buys them both sodas. Pepsi for himself, root beer for Spencer. He doesn't have to think about it, he just orders.

-

The popcorn is in between them, balanced on Spencer's knee. Ryan keeps eating it, even though after a few handfuls he's not eating it for the taste. It's something to do with his hands, something to occupy them so he won't reach over and run the pads of his fingers over Spencer's neck. They're not the only guys in the theatre, sitting side by side and sharing food, but it feels like they are.

Ryan is unaccountably nervous.

-

Spencer whispers into his ear, as always. He narrates the highs and the lows, the gaping plot holes and the awesome moments of fake tragedy. He's closer than he needs to be, Ryan is sure of it. He's not moving away. Spencer's voice is right in his ear, breath puffing out in damp patches on Ryan's skin. Ryan can feel the heat from his mouth. He leans into it, without thinking, and suddenly they're pressed together, shoulder against shoulder. The armrest in between them is a barrier. It's a sudden, unexpected boundary, and Ryan is both grateful and annoyed at its existence.

 _That guy is so fucked_ , Spencer whispers, heedless of the closeness, or maybe he just doesn't care. _Look at him. Bad uniform, bad lines. There's no way he's going to make it past this scene. He's totally dead._

 _Yeah_ , Ryan says, or tries to say. He turns his head and then there's Spencer's mouth, on his mouth, and it seems as though it should be more complicated than this. That there should have been rules, assignments to follow, long looks and tell-tale glances. There should have been something more than a car ride in the morning, empty roads and empty lines at the movie theatre.

Spencer's mouth is sticky from the popcorn butter. He's salty and sweet and Ryan pushes in, pushes forward for more. Their lips slide together, and Spencer's tongue licks at the corner of Ryan's mouth. His hand cups Ryan's jaw and Ryan opens for him, swallowing a moan. Behind them, on the screen, someone is dying.

-

Spencer asks him once, just once. He pauses in Ryan's driveway, hand still on the gear shaft, and says, _do you really want to do this?_ He's smiling, a little, something quiet and secret, meant just for them. Ryan looks at him; his tall frame and his familiar lines, the way his nose tips slightly up and the pale skin at his wrists. _Yeah_ , Ryan says, and he tries to put every ounce of determination into that one syllable. _Yeah, okay_. His stomach is clenched tight, nerves and anticipation.

It's good. Scary, fucking terrifying, but good.

Ryan unlocks the front door. They walk inside and Ryan doesn't know where else to go, so he heads to his room. He sits down on the bed and Spencer sits down next to him. They stare at the floor for a beat, two beats, and then Spencer looks over at him and says, _Okay?_ Like he's asking a question, like he's asking Ryan to roll up the windows or not to drink the last of the milk.

Ryan licks his lips. He sways forward, and Spencer meets him halfway, and then there's that same slide again, sticky and soft. Ryan doesn't have to think too hard about it. Kissing Spencer is like talking to Spencer; it uses the same rhythm, the same motions.

Spencer's hands are on his waist, and then sliding over the strip of skin between Ryan's jeans and his shirt. Ryan leans back at the same time that he tugs Spencer forward, on top of him, and then it's all about learning how to do it from the other side. Ryan's always been on top, always been the one stripping their clothes off and pressing down inch by inch, seeking friction. Now he's on his back, arms up and around, curled in Spencer's hair. Ryan scratches his short nails along the back of Spencer's neck, and he feels him shiver under his hands.

The nice thing is that Spencer doesn't fuck around. They're kissing, and then they're making out, and then Spencer's sucking a bruise into Ryan's collarbone and then somehow, inexplicably, they're almost naked. Ryan blinks, and yes, Spencer's tugging Ryan's jeans down his legs, scowling when they catch on his bony ankles.

"Sorry," Ryan says, and fights the urge to laugh. Spencer smiles.

Ryan's bed is soft, and Spencer's weight presses him down. Ryan bows his spine to accommodate the pressure. It forces his hips up, against Spencer's, and _oh_ , yeah.

That's new.

-

There was never any question in Ryan's mind, what this is, what they're doing. Spencer had opened his mouth and asked, and when Ryan said _yes_ —this is what he'd meant.

It's a not free pass. Anyone else, Ryan thinks, if this was anyone else, he would be cutting and running. Down the stairs and out the door and into the hot Nevada sunshine, and instead he wraps his legs around Spencer's hips and pulls him forward.

Spencer's nails are short, bitten to the quick. They cup the round curve of Ryan's ass, pressed between Ryan's hips and the bed. Ryan opens wider, a quiet invitation. Spencer's hands skitter on his skin, and then he's pressing a thumb over the soft skin behind Ryan's balls. The skin there is covered in soft, wiry hairs. It tickles. Ryan huffs out a laugh into Spencer's mouth, and then Spencer's grinning back, and this is stupid, impulsive, reckless. This could bring everything crashing down, so of course they're going to go full speed. _Take no prisoners,_ Ryan thinks. _No surrender, no defeat._ They've never been good at backing down from anything. From each other.

Spencer's fingertips are cold, when he presses them up, searching. Ryan shifts, rolls his hips, trying to guide him. Spencer's still smiling, and then—

"Fuck," Ryan says, soft. There. Spencer strokes at him lightly, and his smile is gone. His mouth is open and his eyes are wide and fascinated. He presses forward, and then there's give and pressure and a bright hot spark of _something_ , oh, yeah, something, definitely something, but they need to—

"I'll be right back," Spencer mutters, against Ryan's mouth. Ryan nods. He stares up at the ceiling while he listens to Spencer rummage around in the bathroom, trying to catch his breath.

Ryan closes his eyes when he feels Spencer's weight settle back on top of him. It's not that he's afraid. He's not embarrassed. This is sex, this is only sex. It's that Ryan wants to _feel_ it, and he wants to concentrate on the sensation, and it's easier to do that if he can just sit back and get lost in his own head. If he's not watching the way Spencer's eyelashes dip when he looks down at Ryan, the way Spencer's mouth is slick and swollen.

"You look good," Spencer says, right before he's sinking the first finger in. It's such a random thing to say that Ryan almost starts to laugh, but then he's pushing back against Spencer, shifting restlessly. _You look good._ It's the kind of thing he'd get a handwritten note for on one of his poems— _Ryan, I'm sure you know a more descriptive word than "good!"_ It's a non-word. It's one of those "empty sign" things they were talking about in British Literature, words that contain no meaning except to exist.

"Oh," Ryan breathes. "Shit." Spencer's rubbing around his rim with his other fingers, slowly drawing out and sinking back in. Wow.

"More?" Spencer whispers.

"Yeah," Ryan whispers back. "Come on, it's good. More."

 _Empty sign, bullshit_ , Ryan thinks.

-

Hands and knees on the bed, Ryan's palms slipping away on the sheets. It's 1:30 in the afternoon. The sun warms Ryan's pillow, slipping through the curtains.

They'd tried it on Ryan's back, but it was too much, somehow. Too much of not enough, bad angle, Spencer's arms sliding on the sheets. So now it's hands and knees, Spencer's palm pressed to the small of Ryan's back. It's still a lot. Ryan arches his back and breathes in and out, and he can feel the slide, inch by inch, wider and wider until there's nothing left. Spencer's thighs are snug up against Ryan's ass, and Ryan thinks about all the ways they could have ended up somewhere else today. They could be at the mall right now, or in Brendon's stupid purple minivan. They could be driving down the road and blasting My Chem and sublimating their fear of the future into a hatred of the present. That's pretty much the standard, as far as Ryan's concerned.

 _I'm going to,_ Spencer says, and then he's moving, pulling back slowly and pressing forward. Ryan hears himself make a noise, something low and guttural. It's just _so fucking much,_ and Ryan has never considered the size of Spencer's cock until this moment, until he can feel the heat of it inside him.

It's pretty big.

Ryan wants everything, all at once. He wants Spencer to kiss him and he wants Spencer to fuck him slowly, drawing it out, and he wants more of _that,_ shit, the way Spencer's slowly speeding up, pausing to pull out and slick himself up again. The slide back in is wet. Ryan groans, and Spencer echoes him, setting a faster pace.

It's like suddenly Ryan has realized how his body is put together, how everything connects on the inside. He has hands and hips and thighs, and they're all moving together as Spencer fucks him. Ryan is unnaturally aware of his body. He is unnaturally aware of _Spencer's_ body. Everything about this part of it is new.

Spencer's hands slide down Ryan's sides, back up again. They trace a path down Ryan's lean curves, and it makes Ryan buck up into Spencer's thrusts.

They don't speak. Ryan listens to the rhythm of Spencer's breath, reacts on impulse to movement and motion. They don't need to speak. This isn't about words. It's maybe the only thing in Ryan's life that isn't, right now, isn't about him scraping his brain for more and more and more and spilling it out onto to neatly lined sheets. Isn't about him reaching down inside until there's nothing left. Now he's being filled up, filled to the brim, and he doesn't have to speak.

Finally.

Spencer whimpers when he comes, high and needy. Ryan reaches around and grips his hip, pulling him impossibly closer, and Spencer bites down, hard, on the back of his neck as he shoves his hips forward. Ryan can feel himself contracting, fluttering around the new sensation of Spencer coming inside him. It's a hot rush and a sharp spike of pain, and Ryan lets out a whine. He lets Spencer stay inside him as he jerks Ryan off, reaching down and circling his fingers around the head of Ryan's dick. Spencer is fast and rough and not particularly careful, and in the end, that's what does it for Ryan.

 _And now it begins,_ Ryan thinks, in between the shakes and the rise and the fall. In between the moment of no return, and the breathless moments after. _Now it begins, what do we do, now it begins._

-

Spencer is lying naked next to him.

"I was going to take a vow of celibacy," Ryan says. He's tracing the path between thumb and forefinger, holding Spencer's hand hostage to his efforts.

"Were you?" Spencer says.

"Yeah," Ryan says. "I was." He looks up at the ceiling. Spencer's ceiling fan is still spinning slowly, as it had been the whole time they were fucking. Ryan thinks about how the world doesn't care about him, about them.

This is just a blip on a map, a frozen moment in time. There is nothing that makes this moment special, apart from any other moment. There is just the whirring of the ceiling fan, and Ryan's naked body and Spencer's naked body. There is the softness of Spencer's hair against Ryan's shoulder. There is the sunlight, still sneaking in through the window. There is the silence of Ryan's house around them.

"Don't do that," Spencer says, eventually.

"I won't," Ryan says. "It was just an idea."

"A lot of your ideas are dangerous," Spencer says.

"Yeah," Ryan says, softly. "Yeah, sometimes they are." 


End file.
